Abstract
The article deals with the research of the structure of associative fields of the stimulus ‘competitiveness’ for heterogeneous groups of informants – future specialists, specialists in economics and economy and specialists of other professions using a system of research procedures. At the first stage, a free association experiment was carried out, based on the results of which associative fields are constructed and the core, near periphery and far periphery are identified. To clarify the stability/dynamics of the respondents’ idea of the stimulus word, the degree of stereotyped reactions is determined. At the third stage of the research, the general and terminological meanings of the lexeme competitiveness are found out and the level of closeness of lexical and associative meanings is determined. The fourth stage is the analysis of the associative gestalt of associative fields in the three samples, identifying common and distinctive features.
According to the results of the research, it was found out that the core responses of specialists in economics and economy are associates in the form of economic categories; for the samples of specialists in economics and economy and specialists of other professions the associates quality and professionalism are common; in the sample of future specialists the associates competition, power, business are actualised. Respondents in the three samples reproduce a wider range of components of the general-linguistic meaning. Specialists in other professions verbalise the basic components of the term competitiveness and certain components of the term personnel competitiveness, while specialists in economics and economy verbalise both the hyperonym and the hyponyms competitiveness of goods and personnel competitiveness. These findings are confirmed by the associative gestalt of the associative fields in the three samples: differences in the way of associating and the quantitative and qualitative characteristics of the 10 associative gestalt zones.
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